You will have seen the advertisements in the back of some newspapers: "New young models. Open 24 hours. Come and relax and have a professional massage."

We all know this type of ad is almost guaranteed to be for a brothel, and that the services on offer are those of a commercial sexual nature as opposed to a neck rub or steam bath.

If Vera Baird, the redoubtable Solicitor General has her way such ads will soon be a thing of the past. Baird, along with Fiona Mactaggart, Harriet Harman and other feminists in Westminster, is looking to the Republic of Ireland for inspiration on how to legislate against third-party profiteering from the sex industry – namely by newspapers. Ireland's legislation, in place since 1994, reads:

"A person who publishes or causes to be published or distributes or causes to be distributed an advertisement which advertises a brothel or the services of a prostitute in the State or any premises or service in the State in terms, circumstances or manner which gives rise to the reasonable inference that the premises is a brothel or that the service is one of prostitution shall be guilty of an offence."

The legislation includes those advertising prostitution services in other ways, for example displaying notices or posters, circulating leaflets or cards (such as those in telephone boxes) or on radio, television, computer, telephone, fax or photography.

I, for one, will be fully supporting the introduction of such a law. Why? As one politician asked during the campaign to introduce the legislation in Ireland: If we are about to amend our laws to punish prostitutes and pimps, what about the journalistic pimps who take large sums of money to advertise brothels in this manner? What about the people who are deriving a direct profit from the operation of brothels in Dublin?

At Baird's instigation the Crown Prosecution Service here in the UK has taken a close look at the legislation and decided that it could be useful in prosecuting those directly involved in profiting from this abusive industry and could also reduce the numbers of punters paying for sex.

If police can confirm that an ad being published or distributed is for a brothel the publisher is sent a warning of possible arrest and prosecution if the ad runs again. The penalty is a fine of up to £10,000. The legislation is seen as a good preventive measure, as many of publishers drop the ads at this stage.

The law does work. The most high-profile case in Ireland to date was the prosecution of "In Dublin" magazine and its publisher, Michael Hogan, in 1998 (concluding in 2002).

"In Dublin" was banned from running the adverts in 1999 and Hogan was fined €63,000 for knowingly publishing ads that promoted brothels and prostitution. Prior to the case the magazine earned more than €500,000 a year from such ads. Hogan was charged with 53 specimen counts but only pleaded guilty to some.

In Loot there are, on average nine pages of ads for what appear to be prostitution services in London and surrounds. Many contain details of the women's nationalities, and many of the countries mentioned are trafficking hot spots. Obviously this does not mean that the women, simply because they are from South-East Asia, Africa or Eastern Europe have been trafficked but some will have been.

Why should publishers get away with being third-party pimps? With the forthcoming legislation, which would criminalise men who pay for sex with a trafficked or otherwise coerced woman shortly being introduced, a law against publishers who profit from prostitution would be timely. Let us close the net on those sex industry profiteers.